On Emily Dickinson, Service and Love
Hi everyone,
It seems that whatever else the cosmos contemplates, it contemplates dialogue - that is, exchanges of information between observers, each one of whom could be the other.
In that sense, our sharing together - writing, talking, working, studying, playing - reflects an underlying intention that what appears as separate and alien might find its way to unity and love.
I experience A Course in Miracles as a clear means by which to remember that we do not bring forth love alone but in community with others. I am reminded by the course to cooperate, coordinate and communicate with my brothers and sisters so that we might all be happier.
Along those lines, I want to share a tiny Emily Dickinson poem:
I could not drink it, Sue,
Till You had tasted first -
Though cooler than the Water - was
The Thoughtfulness of Thirst -
This quatrain first appeared in 1864, in a private letter to Susan Dickinson. Susan was Dickinson's sister-in-law, closest reader over the course of her writing life and arguably her greatest love.
The poem asserts that love calls us to become servants unto one another. To love someone is not to get something from them but to give to them. The benefits are mutual. As A Course in Miracles observes, "all expressions of love . . . bring more love both to the giver and the receiver (T-1.I.9:2-3).
Thus, Dickinson refuses to sip until the one she loves has sipped first.
But she then goes one step further, observing that finer than water - finer than actually quenching thirst - is the "Thoughtfulness of Thirst."
What does this mean?
Thirst arises naturally in us. We do not choose to be thirsty; we do not create thirst. When conditions specify thirst, we experience thirst. Importantly, if you drink a glass of water, my thirst is not quenched.
Yet Dickinson suggests that if we give close attention to this private experience of thirst, we will discover in it an awareness of the other that actually prioritizes the other, and that this awareness transcends our immediate bodily needs. It transcends a personal self in favor of the other's self. It becomes a kind of inclusive dialogue.
That is, we discover in us a love that is not self-centered but other-centered. And - critically - this focus on the other does not deprive us but enriches us. We will gain the pleasure of sipping eventually but in the interim, we will experience a thoughtful, selfless love that cannot help but express itself through service.
Love extends outward simply because it cannot be contained. Being limitless it does not stop. It creates forever (T-7.I.3:4-5).
Each moment of our living arises for us full of possibilities for sharing. If we give attention to this arising, we will find at its surface a lot our own needs and wants - for food and water, for security and shelter. There is nothing wrong with this. It's natural.
But if we go a little deeper, we will find not only our own needs and wants but a realization of the needs and wants of others. And we will discover as well a desire to respond to those needs, as if they are our own. We discover a unity that redirects our attention away from us and toward our brothers and sisters, and thus to the whole that together we comprise.
To give unto one another is to give unto our own self. Dickinson suggests that our real thirst is for love itself - for communion - and for holiness, broadly (not merely religiously) understood, and that this thirst can only be quenched by loving others.
On this view, happiness arises as a gift we give continuously to others. Given the other, what else shall we do but serve them? What else but love suffices?
Thank you as always for reading and sharing with me.
Love,
Sean